Recovery through HRMC: Trigleth's story

Thursday

Feb 14, 2013 at 3:18 PMFeb 14, 2013 at 3:24 PM

According to Sharon Martin, marketing director at Helena Regional Medical Center, there are so many decisions to make when you must leave home for surgery, especially if there are numerous follow-ups and any type of therapy.

Melissa Martinez

According to Sharon Martin, marketing director at Helena Regional Medical Center, there are so many decisions to make when you must leave home for surgery, especially if there are numerous follow-ups and any type of therapy.
Jessie Trigleth, a resident of Helena and recent carticel transplant patient, was faced with those difficult decisions, which would not only be time consuming, but very costly.
Jessie, only 27 years old, broke his knee two years ago and has had numerous arthroscopic surgeries to remove bone fragments but not before the damage had been done to the cartilage in his knee. So young and possibly facing knee replacement, Jessie was willing to try a carticel transplant. So in October, Ortho Arkansas harvested cartilage cells from his knee, sent them to a lab for the possibility of growing good cartilage cells to be transplanted back into his knee.
Along with the good news that they could create enough cells for a transplant, came the news that the transplant would put Trigleth eight weeks of no weight bearing on his leg and up to 18 months of physical therapy. For Jessie that meant a 240-miles round trip from Little Rock for therapy three times a week. Before the decision was made to have surgery, Jessie started looking at all his options, thinking of what was the best decision for his success with a carticel transplant will not becoming a hardship on his family.
“Jessie is now almost eight weeks post-surgery, and is eager to tell of his journey that has been painful, but rewarding,” reported Martin.
Martin added, “Harland Moore, physical therapist at Helena Regional Medical Center has taken Jessie's rehabilitation as a personal challenge to get this young man back on his feet and headed toward a life of some normalcy and pain free.”
“Harland has followed my physician's orders to the letter, challenged me to work hard and has successfully got my ROM (range of motion) to an amazing level,” said Jessie. “He has addressed many issues and help me look at nutrition differently, which has help my whole body. Everyone in the Helena Regional Rehabilitation Center has been wonderful and three times a week they let me know they are in this journey with me.”
Jessie says that he is hopeful that the carticel transplant is a success, but if he has to take it another step, he will be taking steps right here in Helena at the Helena Regional Acute Inpatient/Outpatient Rehabilitation Center for his recovery.